Flat-rate lawyer fees: can they be agreed below 15%?
Can the 15% flat rate costs that the lawyer indicates on the invoice to request reimbursement from the client as general expenses be indicated in a lower percentage? This in summary question that the COA of Turin addresses to the CNF. More precisely, the COA asks whether it is possible to provide for a 15% percentage reduction in the contractual agreement with the customer or when participating in a public tender.
Flat rate expenses: regulatory framework
The National Forensic Council (opinion no. 28/2024) reminds you that the flat-rate expenses are due in the amount of 15% of the total compensation, as established by Ministerial Decree 55/2014. The percentage of 15% is fixed, the flat-rate expenses are therefore payable to the lawyer automatically, without the obligation to document them as required for out-of-pocket expenses. Not even the judge can intervene in their quantification.
The item “Flat rate expenses” is therefore a parameter that also binds the judge when he provides for the judicial settlement of the lawyer’s fee, but also the parties. In fact, they represent a component of the compensation.
Law no. 49/2023 on fair compensation in article 3 provides for the nullity of clauses that contemplate compensation that is not fair and proportionate to the activity carried out by freelancers registered in a professional register, order or college. In particular, agreements that establish remuneration lower than those established by the liquidation parameters for the aforementioned professionals are void.
In fact, law no. 247/2012 and various ministerial decrees provide the lawyer with a remuneration increased by 15% for flat-rate expenses, a rule that not even the judge can reduce or increase after Ministerial Decree no. 147/2022.
The reduction would decrease the compensation
The 15% increase does not deprive the resulting amount of the compensation value. In fact, out-of-pocket expenses are not included in the percentage of the reimbursement of general expenses, but constitute a separate item.
It follows that: “on the basis of a single logical-systematic interpretation of the discipline referred to in art. 13, paragraph 10, law no. 247/2012 and ministerial decree 55/2014 (and subsequent amendments) and law no. 49/2023 on fair compensation, l’possible reduction of the percentage of 15% established by the ministerial decree for the lawyer’s flat-rate expenses – percentage quantified ex lege – determines a decrease in “compensation” parametric of the lawyer, resulting in violation of the regulations of’fair compensation referred to in law no. 49/2023.”
Read also: Fair compensation for lawyers: rule in force from 2 July
